Sam Lee

Fair play, he didn’t make any saves either

@trharn @PurelyFootball @OptaJoe Think it checks out mate

@PurelyFootball @OptaJoe Weird fact

📊 𝐐𝐔𝐈𝐂𝐊 𝐅𝐀𝐂𝐓: Gabriel Magalhães is the first player to hit a penalty over the crossbar in a UCL final penalty shootout since Milan's Serginho in 2005 (v Liverpool). [@OptaJoe]

🇧🇪Kevin De Bruyne a HBVL: "Come valuto la mia prima stagione in Italia? Direi abbastanza bene, soprattutto l’inizio. E anche quando sono rientrato, credo di essere tornato su un buon livello. Naturalmente non è stato facile, perché Conte ha una visione del calcio molto diversa dalla mia. Non possiamo girarci intorno: lo so anch’io. Non ho mai potuto giocare davvero nella mia posizione. È andata così, ma ho dato sempre il 100%. Ho giocato parecchio, anche dopo l’infortunio, quindi per me va bene. Però giocavamo in modo molto difensivo. Ogni partita finiva più o meno con un solo gol segnato. Con un 5-4-1 è tutto più complicato. All’inizio dell’anno giocavo davvero molto, molto basso. Penso che il nostro miglior marcatore abbia fatto dieci o undici gol, e questo ti fa capire che le statistiche non possono essere alte. Però, per quanto riguarda il livello e il calcio espresso, secondo me è stato abbastanza ok. Sono contento che Conte vada via e che magari si possa giocare in modo un po’ più offensivo? Per me sì, certamente. Per me non doveva restare. Se fosse rimasto, per me non sarebbe stato l’ideale. Resto comunque al Napoli? Avevo sentito dire che, se Conte fosse rimasto, forse avrei potuto voler andare via. Per me è importante avere un confronto sul modo di giocare. Quest’anno ho capito che il tipo di calcio praticato per me conta molto. Deve restare anche divertente. E purtroppo questo aspetto mi è mancato. Quando passa un anno, ti rendi conto che stai anche invecchiando. Ho ancora un anno di contratto, ma voglio parlarne. Perché l’anno scorso erano state dette certe cose: che avremmo giocato in un certo modo, che avremmo fatto questo e quello. Alla fine, però, di quelle cose se ne sono viste poche. Ed è normale che questo dispiaccia"

@hipyjon @SaumilDave13 @_DHOTYA He says so!

@SamLee @SaumilDave13 @_DHOTYA so youre saying the little man is a city fan

Blimey, early contender for @_DHOTYA

@Lea_EFC Or that

@Lea_EFC Some might argue, not necessarily myself, that a dodgy VAR call might fit into a narrative

I’m stuck between wanting Arsenal to be 3-0 down inside 20 minutes and getting absolutely humiliated, or them losing to a 95th minute OG. I want them to suffer, but I’m unsure in the way I want it to happen.

Imagine being able to bring on this calibre of player! Hard to compete with that you’d have to say

@GoonerInParis @Lea_EFC I can’t remember any tbh?

@SamLee @Lea_EFC It's just astounding that City fans dare talk about dodgy VAR calls😅

Artificial intelligences do not undergo experiences, do not possess a body, do not feel joy or pain, do not mature through relationships, and do not know from within what love, work, friendship or responsibility mean. Nor do they have a moral conscience, since they do not judge good and evil, grasp the ultimate meaning of situations, or bear responsibility for consequences. They may imitate or even simulate, but they do not understand what they produce, for they lack the affective, relational, and spiritual perspective through which human beings grow in wisdom. #MagnificaHumanitas

Obviously he doesn’t realise yet that Arsenal don’t have VAR decisions go against them (That’s just a little joke but the first bit is absolutely true)

If you want an update on how far the game has gone, my six-year-old son was playing a football colouring game and coloured in a load of red which he said means Arsenal have scored. Then he said ‘Wait, they’re checking it. Yeah, it’s offside.’ What world are we bringing these kids up in?

Genuinely, I scanned this tweet, saw ‘Hansen’ and the silhouette and thought, ‘an Alan Hansen documentary is a bit niche’

@JPJoker02 I think we’ve all been clicking the wrong button for about a month

why are The Athletic making all their articles free to read now btw. are site hits really that low?

It turns out that people just say this every year

Éric Di Meco won the European Cup with Marseille in '93 He now plays in an Oasis tribute band Ahead of this year’s #UCL final, we spoke about that famous OM side, the match-fixing scandal, Euro ’96, meeting Noel Gallagher - and his favourite Oasis songs nytimes.com/athletic/73115…

Read more from Fernandinho (and Gundogan, Bernardo, Laporte, Gvardiol, Sagna, Fleetwood, Gallagher, Warnock, Robinson, Flynn) on Guardiola’s decade here 👇👇👇 nytimes.com/athletic/72955…

🗣️ Fernandinho on City’s change in style over the years “The first two or three seasons we were so automatically playing one touch, two touches and the opponents knew that. “After that, he changed a little and he said, ‘No, you have to control the opponent’s movement as well, you don’t need to play always one touch or two touches.’ “One of the basics of his principles was ‘control the ball well and then you can pass the ball’, but after a while he changed a little bit, even the training sessions. ‘Keep the ball more at your feet, choose the best path, choose the best action, and then we drive forward compact, the whole team compact.’”

@duncanbishop84 ‘Few praise for Cherki’ after the Arsenal game (I think it was). Doesn’t want players with big egos getting carried away, or players who he thinks should be doing better getting undue praise. And also doesn’t want to bury anybody who’s struggling, but there can be exceptions!

@SamLee He's always seemed as unpredictable to read as his teams. For example: Tell him "X was the best player today, give us a few words about him" and he'll say someone else (who might have had a stinker) was 'incredible'. A kind of consistent inconsistency.

Please forgive the first-personedness of this but I’ve written about covering Guardiola ‘close up from a distance’ for 10 years nytimes.com/athletic/73052…